From Bruce ...

Blue West, 9 Palms, Baja, overhead, 11-years old.

-- Bruce

From Dan ...

Hi Paul,

 

Just back from a trip to Oahu and wanted to share this pic of my daughters after a fun session at Castles.

 

I got a couple great sessions at a reef about 2000' offshore of Kokololio beach park.  Pushing double overhead with some barrels, got my fair share of the set waves and the Omni handled it fine.  A few air drops and one huge tube ride, pretty exciting!  The locals were all cool but somewhat amused, got a few "oldschool" comments.  Also got a fun overhead session at Kamiland.

 

Oh yeah also got some great waves a few weeks back right on the point inside of T's at Jalama.  Just enough kelp to keep the surfers out of there but it was super fun on the mat.  Surfed 1st Crack earlier with my buddies but gotta say the mat session was more memorable.

 

Ride on,

 

Dan

More Video From Aaron And The Epic 3 Foot Swell ...

Mat Riding Tips From Sir Jackie...

From Aaron ...

"This is from the over-hyped, over-crowded 3 foot swell at The Corner. The second one shows the speed potential of a 4GF mat!"

From Regis ...

hi paul it s regis from Biarritz

 ;i didn t arrived to let a messge on your mail ;so with a lot off late thanks for the mats ;they are perfect;last friday my friends stop me on the road and told me than they really want to test surfmat ,cool i ve got 4 now so every body will be happy;saturday was magic 1meter waves ,only friends;it was funny to look at them asking for all ;playing with the pression ;so good to see there mind switch on in full concentration;they looks like teenager in front of there first girl friend ,they stay long time with this big smile after surf and they talk long time about surfmatt after;i let them 2 for playing;and it was a good occasion to test all the mat in the same time ;for the moment my favorite is the standart

Another Vid From Aaron ...

Somewhere near the land of tacos and Chihuahuas, a lone mat rider faces the odds...

From Ace ...

 

 

Paul here are my impressions of the mat so far...

I have been in the water for all of my 65yrs on this planet. I have been riding waves for as long as I can remember. I was lucky enough to make a living shaping surfboards for some pretty big names. I have pretty much made all my surf vehicles from wood "Paipo" stuff as a kid to my current surfboards. The mat is the first surf thing I have not been involved in making in decades.

At first the mat and I were a mystery to each other. I am used to bigger surfboards and I am up out of the water. The mat is IN the water almost part of the water. Just being on it was kind of like trying to sit on a marshmallow. I had not used my legs for propulsion in a long time and swim fins where a forgotten memory. I would go out with a simple task just get out and TRY to catch a few waves. I went for slow progress, some days I would struggle to get what I make that "I" wanted from the mat. The mat would resist me and do what "it" wanted. But somehow we would come together and find at least one "nugget" it was a taste, a tease, but enough to make me stay interested.

The learning curve is well documented and I heard from more than one surfer that they had tried a mat and gave up after a couple times. These were usually surfers who had skipped the swim, bodysurf, old style mats or even Boogie boards and went straight to surfboards. They were not very good surfers and did not have the other skills to put into their mat experience. The mat draws on ALL those ocean experiences one of the main reasons it was starting to hook me. The other is that where I live in So California the surf areas are small and the number of "surfers" on real surfboards sponge boards SUPs longboards shortboards and surf schools dumped into one area just makes it that much harder to just "catch a few" was impacting my lifestyle.

Now I get to "kick" my way out to some of the better peaks and have the big red trucks tell everybody on a surfboard to leave the area. I get Government assistance to my madness. I am a big guy who has a very intimidating "crowd face", so I have been told , and to see me walking down the beach with a pool toy I am sure has some wondering, laughing??? I am getting the last laugh some of the better waves all to myself.

The mat has been an experience like no other. At first I tried to muscle it, it don't like that. There is a balance of strength finesse experience that has to be learned. Yes you can just go out and "ride" waves straight to the beach and if that's all you want from it that part is easy. I want more from it, I want to SURF it like I know waves can be surfed. I have taken it out in waist high stuff to full on almost makeable closeouts. I have been challenging it AND it me, I am getting too old to take the punishment of a closing out beach break trying to hold on to a uncooperative bag of air, but I have done it.

 

There is a reward appearing at the end of the tunnel. The mat and I are starting to understand each other. It senses when I need it to respond. Whether it is getting into the wave at just the right moment to make it. Or when I am heading out and see a set coming it seems to respond with me to get us out there. We are in sync when I have to duck dive, not something I do on my bigger surfboards, as we head under the wave then the mat propels me to the surface. We are becoming one we are in unison we are surfing. There is a zen to it, I need the mat and the mat needs me. We need each other. Without my breaths the mat does not exist. Without the mat I am just body surfing, Or something like that.

 

Paul, I am definitely having fun and am getting ready to take the mat to my secret research proving grounds in South America. Every year I take one of my current experimental surfboards to refine". This year I think I will be just taking the mat. I already have enough surfboards down there. The Idea of having just a rolled up mat and a pair of fins to deal with on the airplanes and buses is a bonus.

Albert "ACE" Elliott

acesurfboards.com
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

OK....

There is more to the story and how the Mats inflated characteristics translate to how my solid boards approach a wave. Years ago Carl Ekstrom and I shared the same shop and we always had a running BS session about board designs. One day Carl said that he liked boards that looked "inflated" that sparked something that became a major part of my surfboard design journey. It is interesting when I get back on "solid" boards that the lines my softer railed rounder bottomed boards draw are very similar to what the mat wants to track.

ACE

From Aaron ...

SURFING GENERAL'S WARNING: Mat surfing greatly increases garage capacity...

(I cut up and tossed out a couple of boards today to make room for more 4GF mats!)

Aaron

Two Recent Vids from Aaron ...

Shot some footage of Rincon in a tiny and gutless day:






A much better video of good waves. I rode the standard, got to try out Gary's Omni on one wave:

Prono Paradiso Aftermath... From Neil Pye!

Hello PG!
 

I was totally stoked out of my gourd Saturday!

 

Prono was a complete success, by my own standards, but everybody else there seemed to be having a brilliant time also and ALL of them believed it to be a success and were wondering when the next one was going to be.

 

From the mat perspective, I got almost everyone there to ride a 4GF - even for just 2 waves! I got a few of the established mat riders to try the Lotus7, and all agreed that it was the best 4GF we had ridden!

 

It's funny though, we all had a blast and everyone tried everything there but Paipos and handplanes were a bigger hit than mats. I guess its hard to get into riding mats so quickly, since they are totally different to the hard shapes.

 

Either way, it all reminded me why I ride and love mats!

 

I'll send you some photos. These are just from Grant Newby's camera.

#1 and #2 are of me...

 

 

 

 

Me and Toshie and the Itako Japanese Paipo (I've forgotten the lovely girl's name, oops!)

 

 

Tom and Finley Wegener

Mat Max and Geoff Moase.  Max (Pahl) is a character! Will hopefully surf with him again before he leaves Oz.

Geoff from Dovetail Surfboards

 

 

 

Young guy with a Wegener bellyboard

Tent City!

 

 

 

Here's a video from Rhyse Edward Jones... 

 

Pismo Beach Session, 10/8/13

I'm the one taking the picture.  My son Robin is on the left with his hand on the mat. We took turns with two mats and enjoyed a rare glassy afternoon. 

Bob

From Tom ...

Hey Paul,

Greetings from New Yoak.

Took the A-train from Brooklyn out to 90th St at 6:30 this morning. Watched the rising sun´s reflection off Mannhatan on the ride.

Glassy offshore, small waves, but my "co-worker" was grinning from ear to ear after his first slide on a mat and on every little wave after that. Then some humpback whales started breaching in the background. (It´s true.)

Glad, the mats are so easy to take along.

Cheers
Tom

Matting Is Technical !!!

 

 

Hi Paul,

 

Jason Hall shot me at the Point at Ho'okipa today. I did some frame grabs to show how technical matting is. The push over the edge, air over a bump, on edge bottom turn and cut back. Fun! :)

 

Matt

From Captain Tom ...

Hopa Pablo,

Sending out a GOOD caipirinha (con pinga e limao) to you and your wife  (from Jersey !) from my dive in Boiçucanga.

Had a great day today on the Tracker and the Vespa. The last video of GG was very inspiring!

Had two locals in Maresias feel the mat while paddling out - after seeing me connect sections in mushy/wedgy 10ft waves - shake their heads in smiling disbelief and just say 'Legal'- which amounts to 'Cool/Rad/Awesome!' in these parts.

And they don't even drop in on me any more...here.

Cheers
Tom

Do You Love The Wave You're Riding?